Thanks very much for the post, it was great too hear about this change of vectors and your perspective on it. It also makes future blogging strategies seem more clear cut. I could never manage a full vlog – it just wouldn’t work for me and my purposes. But spicing up my own blogs with some original video, well, that’s another matter. In fact after reading your post I am rekindling my interest in getting a video camera.

I have had so many opportunities come my way because of my blog and visitors are on the upswing. My blog is almost 3 years old now and has changed tremendously in content and my platform has changed as I learned more about the medium – from MSN Spaces to Blogger to wordpress.com to finally hosting my own wordpress blog (which I love)

I don’t think blogging is dying, but I do think that it’s not for everyone. People who start for the wrong reasons or don’t enjoy writing, reading, commenting and exchanging links have blogs that either stagnate or fail to grow (unless you’re a superstar).

I do use Facebook and Twitter as extensions of my blog, but not as a replacement.

On my blog, I write about clay, pottery, techniques, glaze recipes, environmental aspects of making pottery, buying local handcrafted items, and sometimes family/personal stuff. While I’m no expert, occasionally I write about social media, blogging, SEO and how it affects pottery related blogs. But, mainly my audience is other potters and clay enthusiasts – and I have been given opportunities to teach and show my work because of my site. It takes perseverance and a willingness to invest the time it takes to create good content.

I think as time goes on, more people will become Internet savvy and we will actually see an increase in bloggers. What I think part of the problem is now is that the people who’ve been blogging for a few years have basically seen everything that’s written (over and over again) and they crave something new. We have to take a step back and remember that not everyone has read that SEO article.

Also, although zeroing in on one particular niche for your articles can help, I find many times being too focused is limiting. I blog about being an online entrepreneur so I talk about blogging, sitemaps, seo, marketing, customer service, etc.

That’s quite a range of topics some might think and could turn some people away. I feel, however, if someone wants to learn a trade, they need to know all the aspects of it. However, like you said, focusing on one topic does seem to have some advantages.

We just need to keep in mind that most people in this world view blogs as just another website. And once you have that insight, you can speak to them in their language. Remember who your target customers are: bloggers or others?

I also appreciate the fact that a lot of personal blog are taking an interesting turn, as I feel blogging to becoming more focused.

I do believe in blogging and I do think it has a future!

I stated in my blog that blogging is important for underrepresented groups that are ignored by the MSM.

http://justinleon.com/2008/10/bloggingisnotdead/

Video blogging on the other hand is not as openly embraced in internet society. On a place like YouTube, a vast majority of viewers seeking content watch pirated tv shows or other crap.

Vloggers are pretty much ignored unless you go to places like Viddler or Vimeo.